Movie: Broken Flowers

Last night I checked out the latest from one of my favorite directors, Jim Jarmusch.

He's been uneven since the career peak of Dead Man in '95, one of the finest films ever made. His work since has given the impression that he's just been spinning his wheels and cashing paychecks, having made his ultimate artistic statement.

Lacking the fortitude or wherewithal to embrace JD Salinger's final solution, he's been doodling movies the last few years like a man gingerly nibbling saltine crackers to settle his stomache following a glorious twelve course bacchanal.

Ghost Dog had some nice ideas and good scenes but was bascially a goof, a NYC hipster takeoff on a formula gangster pic, owing somewhat more than a debt of gratitude to the deadpan postmodernism of films like Kitano's Sonatine and earlier, Seijun Suzuki's prescient mod ganster wipeouts Branded to Kill and Tokyo Drifter.

It also appropriated several scenes directly from various Hong Kong action movies, most noteably assassination via toilet (lifted shot for shot from the carefree and criminally entertaining Naked Killer), an act borne more of laziness than hommage.

So I went into his latest with a bit of trepidation.

Short version:
I liked it.
It's his best work since Dead Man, which unfortunately isn't saying a whole lot.

Longer version:

All his trademarks are in evidence- long, slow burning takes, plenty of driving scenes through scenically depressed areas, deadpan humor to spare. The film comes together better than Ghost Dog, but still seemed to me more a collection of scenes than a unified whole.

The main issue for me (after one viewing) was the meandering progress of the main character, played by Bill Murray (doing his usual stellar job).

He's doesn't really follow any narrative path, he's just shoved out into the river by his neighbor Winston and floats downstream until the film reaches it's running time, depositing him more or less where we found him, slightly worse for wear after enduring some rapids, but essentially unchanged.

Pluses: The family next door, who provide all the light and life in the film as well as forcing the reluctant protagonist to pursue the storyline. Without them the film promised to be two hours of Bill Murray watching television on his leather sofa while the flowers wilted on the mantle.

Lovely shots and individual scenes, as always. I don't think Jarmusch could make an ugly film if he tried.

Murray is fantastic, but that's a given. And even his sublime expressiveness is mildly overburdened by the mute immobility of his character.

Minuses: A bit of the same problem that Ghost Dog had, lack of smooth narrative flow in some spots, and a couple of scenes that didn't seem to sever any purpose other than to make Murray and the audience uncomfortable.

Overall though a good watch, if you don't mind a slow, contemplative pace and an ending that had one patron ranting in the lobby "Where's the MORAL?"

Not on a par with his greatest films, but a heartening return to something like form.